This thread is part of the Translator playground: a place for translators to have fun, to network, to learn, and to hone their translation or linguistic skills. See the announcement here.

Need a quick break from work? In this forum translators and language professionals can share quotes about translation, tongue twisters and word plays, translation challenges, etc.

All are welcome to participate and to add new items to this and the other areas of the Translator playground; have fun with it! If you need help or would like to propose an addition to the Translator playground, contact site staff through the online support system.

Today I flagged this story about how some movie titles were translated into other languages in different countries.

Here are some of the translations the films received according to the article:

* ‘Annie Hall’ became ‘Urban Neurotic’ in Germany,

*‘Dumb And Dumber’ in Spain was dubbed ‘Two Stupid People, One More Stupid’,

----------------------------------
And then a few of the titles that have in fact been 'translated' into English, from the English original name, so the so-called Finnish name is in fact something altogether different, and still in English. I kid you not.

Also in Italian it can happen (and indeed there are many examples) that the title of a film is translated in a way that it becomes unrecognisable.
Some examples that come to my mind:
-How to Lose Friends and Alienate People becomes Star System-Se non ci sei non esisti (lit. If you're not there, you don't exist) in Italian; I've just read that it's Nueva York para principiantes (lit. New York for beginners) in Spanish and Un Anglais à New York (lit. An Englishman in New York);
-Knocked Up becomes Molto incinta (Very pregnant) in Italian;
-The Back-Up Plan becomes Piacere, sono un po' incinta (Nice to meet you, I'm a bit pregnant).

Some of the Italian titles are even funnier than the original ones, although I don't see why they translate them in this way. The same goes for novels.

Subject:

Comment:

The contents of this post will automatically be included in the ticket generated. Please add any additional comments or explanation (optional)

There is no moderator assigned specifically to this forum. To report site rules violations or get help, please contact site staff »

Join this translator’s group buy brought to you by ProZ.com and buy SDL Trados Studio 2017 Freelance for only €415 / $495 / £325 / ¥60,000
You will also receive FREE access to our getting started eLearning program!